Twin Study is a new exhibition from Melbourne-based artist Tom Gerrard which opens tomorrow night Outré Gallery in Fitzroy, Melbourne. Originally coming up painting graffiti, Tom is “known for painting simplified characters, architecture and nature using a minimal colour palette. The characters and elements that make up his paintings have been inspired by people he’s seen and places he’s been”.
We got wind of Twin Study this morning, so we blew up Tom’s phone while he was busy setting up the show, so we could find out a little more. This interview was conducted via a series of text messages and voice memos. Ahhh, technology.
Hi Tom, thanks for making a few moments for us ahead of your show at Outré Gallery tomorrow night. Can you please tell us how this show came to be?
The show at Outré came to be through me exhibiting with them in the past. I was part of a group show about a year ago, and since then I did a print with them. The gallery has really looked after me in Melbourne, and they’ve sold a lot of my work, so the natural evolution was to have a solo show with them.
The show is called Twin Study. Can you tell us about the work you’ve made for this show, and the meaning behind Twin Study?
The idea behind the exhibition came from the fact that I’m a twin myself, and my mum’s a , and I’ve got twin cousins and, my grandma had twins – twin sisters and everything. So, there’s lots of twins in my family, and my family is part of a thing called the twin study.
I was working on a painting that featured a lot of heads that I paint. I noticed there were lots of similarities in a lot of them. And they almost grouped up like twins. As I was thinking of names for one of the pieces, I thought ‘Twin Study’ is a good name. Then I started doing more paintings based off that first painting, so I decided to name the whole show Twin Study.
You’re showing alongside Jillian Evelyn, who is a Los Angeles-based illustrator/ artist. Have you worked with her before? How did this pairing come to be?
I haven’t worked with Jillian Evelyn before, but we met when I was in New York last year. We caught up and had lunch.
Names were being thrown around for who I was to show with. Her name came up and I said, ‘I’d love to show with Jillian’. It’s just really fortunate that we had a chance to catch up, and we got along really well. I like her artwork and she likes my artwork. So, it all worked really well. Also, the gallery has dealt with Jillian in the past and also with me. It just seemed like a natural fit, really.
Her show is called ‘Skinny Dippers’, how do the two shows co-exist together? Are there any similarities, or cohesion between the two bodies of work? Or are they both completely different? Either way, how would you describe the works in context of each other?
Jillian and I didn’t really talk about the show much. She focused on her work, and I focused on mine. But with the way we work, [there are similarities] you know, we both like to work with flat colour, and we don’t really use any shading, and things like that. So, our styles naturally work together.
Can you tell us any music you listened to, movies/docos you watched, or books read during the making of this body of work? Anything else that might have had a direct or indirect impact on you or the work?
I listen to music all day in the studio and I just like to get in the flow of things. I’ve been listening to a lot of jazz lately. Also, I listen to a lot of vintage reggae – Rocksteady, Ska, Roots, things like that. That helps me get in the flow. And I just like to play around a lot.
Also, I’ve been buying a lot of art books lately. It’s sort of become a new hobby for me. Instead of just buying art magazines, or relying on Instagram, to just see what’s happening. I like to find artists who I really admire, who have passed away, or are from a different era, and start really researching them. That’s really influenced how I’ve been approaching my paintings.
Some books I’ve bought are about artists like David Hockney, and Roy Lichtenstein.
Jacob Lawrence is another artist that I’ve really been getting into. He’s an old African American artist from the 40s and he paints a lot where he doesn’t use outlines or anything. It’s just colours that meet up against each other, and I really like that style. It’s quite graphical, and almost vector-ish, and modern. But it was all done in the 40s by a 21-year-old. He’s probably one of my biggest inspirations at the moment.
Getting back to Hockney, one of the reasons I really like him is because he changes it up all the time. He jumps around from different styles, different techniques, and different mediums. And that’s something I really like to do as well. I’m not really interested in just doing the same thing over and over again. With Lichtenstein, one of the things I like about him is he didn’t really start making a name for himself as an artist until he was in his 40s, and I’m in the same boat.
Anything else you want people to know about the show?
This isn’t the show I sat down to work on, like a normal exhibition. With most exhibitions, I’d sit down, and I’d really work out what one piece is going to look like, and then base every piece off that. With this, I jumped around styles a bit more. The way that Outré works as a gallery allows for that a lot more. They work with a lot of different styles and it’s a gallery you can get away with doing that. So, I thought this is a prime opportunity to really experiment.
Also looking at ways to get a continuous line. I worked with a lot of different materials in this show, and one of the things that I landed on was airbrush. A lot of pieces have got airbrush in them. I also use a lot of graffiti implements that I’ve grown up with. Things like Wite-Out pens and mop pens and things I’ve always had my pockets, since painting graffiti. I still carry that sort of stuff around, so that just naturally ends up in my artwork.
I really enjoy telling a story of my past, up until my present, through the mediums I use, and the mediums that are around me. I go to the art shop and look for art supplies, but I prefer to buy a bucket of mistint than a tube of paint, if you know what I mean. I work with things like that.
What’s coming up for you in 20/20?
I’ve got a lot of plans for 2020. I’m going to be coming up to the Gold Coast for a show in June, and I haven’t started working on that yet. But yeah, I’m doing that, and also, I’m hoping to do a bit of travelling.
I travel every winter. In Melbourne, it gets a bit cold, so I go somewhere warm for a couple of months. I think I’ll be heading over to Bali again. And just continuing to paint and evolve my artwork, develop new styles, and techniques, and grow my name as an artist.
Thanks Tom.
Tom Gerrard’s ‘Twin Study’ opens alongside Jillian Evelyn’s ‘Skinny Dippers’, 6 pm, Thursday, 23 January, at Outré Gallery in Melbourne – 319 Smith Street, Fitzroy, VIC.
The exhibition continues until 10 February.
Follow @tom_gerrard_ on Instagram, and visit tom-gerrard.com
Luke Shirlaw is the founder of Artillery Projects – a graffiti art publisher, and visual studio specialising in mural production, graphic design, and content creation. Follow him on Instagram, or subscribe to Artillery’s ‘The Drop’ for exclusive email interviews.